Your spine gets a lot of compression from daily activities & strength training:
- Sitting on your chair for long periods
- Heavy Front Squats
- Heavy Deadlifts
The spinal decompression procedure increases your spinal health & mobility by restoring its original length.
Procedure for Spinal Decompressions. You’ll need a pull-up bar to perform the spinal decompression procedure. Next:
- Hang from your pull-up bar
- Relax all muscles, especially the trunk muscles
- Hold for as long as you can
The longer you hang, the better. I perform the spinal decompression procedure for at least 5 minutes. I know what you’re thinking: my grip can’t hold for that long.
Spinal Decompression & Grip. I never use straps. Except when doing spinal decompressions. Straps will allow you to hang on the pull-up bar for extended periods of time, without your grip giving out.
Choose nylon-type lifting straps, they are more durable. Or lifting hook straps.
Relaxing the Trunk Muscles. To decompress your spine properly, you need to relax your trunk muscles.
- Hang from the pull-up bar
- Inhale deeply
- Hold your breath
- Tighten every muscle in you body as hard as you can
- Hold the tension for about 5 seconds
- Suddenly let all the air go along with the tension
You’ll drop & feel the spine lengthening.
Spinal Decompression Procedure Video.
I perform spinal decompressions at the end of my workouts for at least 5 minutes. Try it & post your experience using the comments.
Great tip! I’m tempted to get back to the gym today and try it out, but it’ll probably just happen tomorrow.
The video is crazy boring, by the way. Just giving you a hard time
This is excellent advice, Mehdi. Everyone should be doing it. It takes most people a while to work up their time though. I’ve had clients who couldn’t last 15 seconds in that postition to start with.
Stephen,
Crazy boring indeed
As I wrote: I do these for 5mins, you only got the first 1 min 
Good luck at the gym.
Just ran into this:
http://www.disc-traction.com/
so cute
Hehe very cute indeed, wazzup
hmmmm.. I tried it today and my lower back (SI) started hurting a bit. The straps made hanging quite comfortable, although I couldn’t 5 minutes straight .
Wazzup,
Your lower back shouldn’t be hurting. Do the spinal decompression procedure more & check your overal posture (lordosis?).
You’ll get used to the straps. Continue doing the exercise.
Inversion tables work nicely for decompression. I’ve been using one for a couple years. They’ve become more affordable; however, take up alot of space.
I want to buy one in the future.
Gravity boots work the same way.
I have a pull up bar at home. The type that is fasten at the door frame. Can I hang on that one and just have my leg bent a bit? Would that work?
Sure Glenn, it will work very well. You can keep your legs in the air too, they don’t need to touch the floor.
For those who have problems holding the bar. You might also take a look at lifting hook straps
I like the concept, but whenever i do it my shoulders cause me some discomfort. Feels like they’re going to get pulled out of the socket. Usually is the reason i’ll have to cut it short. Suggestions?
You’re probably tight in your shoulders. Might want to work on shoulder flexibility first doing shoulder dislocations. Keep your shoulder tight in the meanwhile.
Thanks for the response, i figured my shoulders were just a bit tight. And i have been doin the shoulder dislocates everyday so far, coming along nicely.
Flexibility will quickly increase with Shoulder Dislocations Kabir. Continue the good work.
These decompressions really help, long live stronglifts.com : - )